International Research Fellowship Program: Mechanisms Underlying Tactical Deception and Counterdeception in Capuchin Monkeys: Stress and Skepticism

国际研究奖学金计划：卷尾猴战术欺骗和反欺骗的机制：压力和怀疑

• 批准号: 0965074
• 负责人: Brandon Wheeler
• 金额: $ 16.13万
• 依托单位: Wheeler Brandon C
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Fellowship Award
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-05-01 至 2012-04-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0965074&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: International; Research; Fellowship; Program; Mechanisms

The International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad. This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Brandon C. Wheeler to work with Dr. Julia Fischer at the German Primate Center in Gottingen, Germany with field work done at Iguazu National Park in Argentina. The cognitive abilities of primates are argued to have evolved so that individuals can outwit group-mates in competitive interactions by using, among other tactics, deceptive and counterdeceptive behaviors. However, because such behaviors are rare, the proximate mechanisms underlying these behaviors have not been examined in wild primates and it is thus unknown if they are indeed driven by cognitive mechanisms. Recent work by the PI with wild tufted capuchin monkeys in northeastern Argentina has shown that these primates use alarm calls (i.e., vocalizations normally given in response to predators) during feeding but when no predators are present. The calls often cause dominant individuals to run out of the food patch and allow the more subordinate caller to gain access to the food. However, listeners reduce the success of these deceptive alarms by ignoring them more often than they do honest alarms. As the first systematic evidence of deception and associated counter-deception in wild primates, this presents an ideal study system to examine if cognitive abilities are necessary to explain the observed behaviors. In the current study, the PI is investigating the mechanisms underpinning the observed deceptive and counter-deceptive behaviors in the same population of Argentine capuchin monkeys. Specifically, this study addresses two questions. First, because previous studies have indicated that alarm calling behaviors may be controlled by the production of cortisol, a hormone associated with stress, is it possible that deceptive alarms are driven proximately not by cognitive mechanisms, but by hormonal reactions to competition-induced stress? Second, is counterdeception better explained as a recognition of subtle acoustic differences between honest and deceptive alarm calls, or as skepticism of calls given in competitive contexts? The first question is addressed by experimentally manipulating food distribution and measuring the levels of cortisol excreted in the feces of dominant and subordinate individuals. The second question is addressed by analyzing audio recordings of honest and deceptive alarm calls to determine if they differ acoustically, and by playing audio recordings of deceptive alarm calls to the subjects in noncompetitive contexts to determine if they respond with antipredator reactions more often in the latter context than they do during competitive feeding contexts. Hormonal and bioacoustic analyses are being conducted at the German Primate Center in Göttingen, Germany. The results will elucidate the degree to which cognition underlies the deceptive and counterdeceptive behaviors observed in this species and may provide insight into the evolutionary origins these behaviors in humans. Beyond the project's intellectual merit, this grant funds training for a young US researcher in laboratory analyses which are increasingly being used to understand the evolution of behavior in primates and other animals. Such knowledge will prove critical as the PI moves forward in his teaching and research career, as will the collaborative relationships developed between the PI and international research institutions during the funding period.

国际研究奖学金项目使美国科学家和工程师能够在国外进行9至24个月的研究。该计划的奖励为联合研究提供了机会，并利用独特或互补的设施、专业知识和国外的实验条件。该奖项将支持布兰登·c·惠勒博士与朱莉娅·菲舍尔博士在德国哥廷根的德国灵长类动物中心进行为期24个月的研究，并在阿根廷伊瓜苏国家公园进行实地考察。人们认为，灵长类动物的认知能力已经进化到使个体能够在竞争互动中通过使用欺骗和反欺骗行为等策略胜过群体同伴。然而，由于这种行为很少见，这些行为背后的近似机制尚未在野生灵长类动物中进行研究，因此尚不清楚它们是否确实由认知机制驱动。PI最近在阿根廷东北部对野生卷尾猴进行的研究表明，这些灵长类动物在进食期间会发出警报（即，通常是对捕食者发出的声音），但在没有捕食者的情况下。这种叫声通常会导致占主导地位的个体跑出食物区，让更下级的呼叫者获得食物。然而，听众往往忽略这些虚假的警报，而不是真实的警报，从而降低了这些警报的成功率。作为野生灵长类动物欺骗和相关反欺骗的第一个系统证据，这提供了一个理想的研究系统来检验认知能力是否需要解释观察到的行为。在目前的研究中，PI正在调查在同一种群的阿根廷卷尾猴中观察到的欺骗和反欺骗行为的机制。具体来说，这项研究解决了两个问题。首先，因为之前的研究表明，报警行为可能是由皮质醇（一种与压力相关的激素）的产生控制的，那么是否有可能，欺诈性警报的驱动直接不是认知机制，而是荷尔蒙对竞争引起的压力的反应？第二，反欺骗是更好地解释为对诚实和欺骗性警报之间细微声音差异的识别，还是对竞争环境中发出的警报的怀疑？第一个问题是通过实验操纵食物分配和测量从优势和从属个体粪便中排泄的皮质醇水平来解决的。第二个问题是通过分析诚实报警和欺骗性报警的录音来确定它们在声学上是否不同，并通过向非竞争环境中的受试者播放欺骗性报警的录音来确定他们在后者的环境中是否比在竞争喂养环境中更经常地做出反捕食者的反应来解决。荷尔蒙和生物声学分析正在德国Göttingen的德国灵长类动物中心进行。这些结果将阐明认知在多大程度上构成了在这个物种中观察到的欺骗和反欺骗行为的基础，并可能为人类这些行为的进化起源提供见解。除了该项目的智力价值之外，这笔资金还用于培训一名年轻的美国研究人员进行实验室分析，这些分析越来越多地用于了解灵长类动物和其他动物的行为进化。这些知识对于PI在他的教学和研究生涯中向前发展至关重要，在资助期间PI与国际研究机构之间建立的合作关系也是如此。